By Antonis Stroggylakis / info@eurohoops.net
Panathinaikos Athens went to Peace and Friendship arena as the underdog in the battle against “eternal rival” Olympiacos Piraeus. They were missing leading scorer Nemanja Nedovic (sprain) and their opponents had (and still do) a superior record in the EuroLeague regular season while fighting for a playoffs spot with much better chances.
Howard Sant-Roos (a career-high 20 points on 4-6 triples plus five assists), Dinos Mitoglou (15 points, six rebounds), and Lefteris Bochorides (15 points) stepped up offensively and the whole Panathinaikos squad did an exceptional job in defense and rebounding to escape with a 77 – 88 win, their second-ever away victory over Olympiacos in EuroLeague.
Olympiacos fell to 11 – 13 and sees the playoff zone getting further while Panathinaikos, that was already far from serious postseason contention, improved to 9 – 14.
The Greens dominated the boards 37 – 19, grabbing 15 on the offensive end – nine more than its opponents – and led from near start to finish. Their high level of concentration was also illustrated in their free-throw accuracy (25-25, a club best in EuroLeague).
Shaq McKissic had 20 points plus five rebounds and Hassan Martin scored 11 for Olympiacos that had to deal with the absences of injured forwards Kostas Papanikolaou and Sasha Vezenkov. The hosts led for a moment in the beginning and then had to play catch-up following a 13 – 0 run of Panathinaikos for the 7 – 14.
Panathinaikos successfully repelled every attempt of Olympiacos to get the lead and also had a couple of strong responses in the final period and down the stretch. After Giannoulis Larentzakis made it 59 – 61 early in the fourth quarter, Oded Kattash’s players made a 0 – 7 run for the 59 – 68 with 7:38 to play.
Kostas Sloukas scored for the 74 – 80 and then the 77 – 82 with 39 seconds remaining in a last-ditch effort for Olympiacos, but then Mitoglou dunked the ball on the other end after an assist by Sant-Roos to seal his team’s triumph.